Transfer students occupy Kaul Hall despite lease ending

Despite planning for the loss of the University's year-to-year lease of Kaul Hall at Rosemont College, space became available this past June for the 30 resident who currently live there.

In previous years, the University has rented living space in Kaul Hall on the campus of Rosemont College, located just down Ithan Avenue from Villanova, to cope with the high demand for housing.

"It would be nice at some point in the future to have one: no triples for freshman students and two: some beds for incoming transfer students," Vice President for Student Life Rev. John Stack, O.S.A., said, acknowledging the increasing overflow from the University's residence halls.

The demand for on-campus housing at Villanova should come as no surprise to students. 

Residential students must navigate the housing lottery system each year, and some students are guaranteed four years of housing through a certain scholarship or academic program, while others are not.

Transfer students have not been guaranteed housing for at least the past 30 years, according to Stack. 

However, Kaul Hall has recently been used by the University to house transfers, as well as rising seniors who are not guaranteed on-campus housing and elect to enter the housing lottery via a wait list.

Villanova's year-to-year lease of Kaul Hall was put in jeopardy last fall when Rosemont notified the University that its usual housing space would not be available at all, due to an increase in Rosemont's enrollment.

Previously, the entire building was leased and reserved for Villanova students. 

Kaul Hall is capable of housing around 120 residents.

This past June, however, director of Residence Life Tom DeMarco learned that Rosemont would actually be able to lease the first floor of the building for the current academic year.

As a result of the extra housing space that suddenly became available, 30 students currently reside in Kaul Hall. Most are transfer students and several are seniors.

If the space at Rosemont had not materialized, all of those students would have been forced to search the area for apartments and other alternative housing options.

Such a task would be especially difficult for transfer students, who often do not know the status of their admission to the University until much later than the search for an apartment in the area would need to begin.

A disclaimer on the section of Residence Life's website for transfer students states, "There is no guarantee that housing will be available via the wait list, and wait list decisions will not be made before July."

The lease of Kaul Hall was finalized so close to the start of the academic year,  according to Stack.

It is possible that potential transfer students may have chosen to attend a different university after struggling to find off-campus housing, he explained.

According to Stack, a small portion of on-campus housing may become vacant after the fall semester. Between 50 and 100 students typically move off-campus to graduate early or study abroad for the spring semester.

Coincidentally, about the same number of students tend to transfer to Villanova each year.

However, the opportunities for students to move from Kaul Hall to on-campus housing differ from year to year, and there is no guarantee that any current Kaul Hall residents will eventually be able to reside on campus later in the year.